Having flown north overnight from Dar es Salaam to Zürich on Swiss International, very early the next morning my seatmate and I looked out down over the Alps below and saw an amazing sight—totally clear weather. I knew immediately that this was good fortune, but would now make for an even longer day than I had planned after a tiring overnight flight.

Before discussing how easy it was to make my connections, I have to repeat that this was Switzerland! Things work here! Everything is coordinated! These people know what they’re doing! Which brings me to a story about Swiss professionalism.

I remember reading once about an American watchmaking company that wanted to prove to the Swiss how far advanced they’d become. They sent a package to a leading Swiss watchmaking company that contained a piece of very thin wire, and the accompanying letter boasted how American technology had progressed to the point that they were able to produce a piece of wire this thin.

Nothing happened for several months. Then, a package arrived back at the American company that had no explanatory letter. It just contained the same piece of wire. The Americans didn’t understand until they sent it to their lab to have it analyzed. On close inspection, it was discovered that the Swiss had drilled a hole down the center of the entire length of the thin piece of wire, making it look like a drinking straw. That’s Swiss skill and Swiss technology, and it can also give you an idea of what Swiss organizational ability is like.

The traveler notices this organizational ability in the transportation system, to the point where it works so perfectly that it makes you sigh. Trains, boats, and buses move—dare I say it—like clockwork. They are also coordinated. A schedule may say to take a train to one point, where a boat will be waiting to connect you across the lake to a Postbus, which will bring you to another train connection, which will get you to where you’re going. If you don’t believe it, just check the schedules.

I’ll cite the situation in Luzern (lu.TSAIRN; = Lucerne). The Hauptbahnhof / Main Railroad Station, which has hundreds of connections to everywhere, is located where the Vierwaldstättersee empties into the Reuss (ROISS), which then flows through town. Directly across from the station is the steamer dock, so you can get off the train, walk just a few steps, and get on the boat. And as you walk this short route, you walk through what is essentially an open-air bus terminal, just in case that was the connection you wanted.

There are a number of variants of the Eurailpass for train travel in Europe, limited to just one or a few countries. I used one in Scandinavia in 2006 that was valid in five adjoining countries, which was just what I needed. There are also one-country rail passes, and that’s what I had purchased for Switzerland—the Swiss Pass, for first-class travel. It covers a set number of days, and is good for all trains, ships, buses, city transportation, most museums, and has 50% discounts on most funiculars and other mountain transportation. All you need in addition—on some special routes only—is a seat reservation, which I carefully plotted out in advance and purchased before leaving New York. So I was all set to see Switzerland again from one border to another.

I say “again” because I had been earlier to everywhere I went this time except for Meiringen (which may have turned out to have been my favorite stop—see below). Way back in 1957, on my first, “teenage” trip to Europe with a friend, we had stopped for some time in Interlaken. In 1981, Beverly and I did an extensive tour. The very last time I had stepped into Switzerland, though, was six years ago (2002/3 “Maggiore”), when, coming from Venice, we drove through the Italian lake district, and I drove into Italian Switzerland for a few hours one afternoon, since we’d never been there. In any case, a new trip was due.

At the airport very early that first morning, I stopped at the rail desk to get my Swiss Pass validated, then simply took the escalator down to the frequent trains to the Zürcher Hauptbahnhof. I had learned to live out of a small bag for two nights in Tau, two nights in Vic Falls, and seven nights in Tanzania. It had struck me much earlier that I didn’t want to take my regular wheeled bag all around Switzerland for ten nights, especially since I’d end up in Zürich again at the end anyway, so at the station I arranged to leave my wheelie and lived once again out of the small bag, which turned out to be a clever move. Then I hopped one of the very frequent trains from Zürich to Luzern. I had booked a very pleasant hotel opposite the side of the station, where I then left even my small bag, and then started out for a full day.

Die Rigi   Let’s first make it clear that die Rigi and der Pilatus are two mountains around Luzern, and both also on the Vierwaldstättersee. In addition, the access to each is exciting in and of itself. In the past, I’d never paid too much attention to one mountain or another when standing in the center of Luzern, but this morning, the sky was so clear that you couldn’t help noticing the two mountains. Standing at the bridge over the Reuss next to the boat dock at the station, and looking east across the lake, die Rigi is of reasonable height and green most of the way up. Turning south at the same point, der Pilatus strikes awe. It’s taller, and closer, all gray above the tree line, and the several pinnacles at the top are very craggy and impressive. After the night on the plane, I had only planned to see the Rigi in the morning and then walk through Luzern in the afternoon, leaving visiting the Pilatus for the next day on the way to Meiringen, but before long I realized I shouldn’t throw that perfect weather away, so I planned to see the Rigi in the morning, then the Pilatus in the afternoon, and then stroll through Luzern in the early evening. It was a wise move, since the weather was less good the next day.

Die Rigi (an almost-rhyme with “piggy”, but instead use the vowels in “Fifi”) lies just across that X-shape of this part of the Vierwaldstättersee. For a long time it was thought that the name derived from the Latin phrase Mons Regina, or Queen Mountain, but the origin is much more mundane than that. It derives from the Latin—and Italian—word “riga”, which describes a line, crease, or a fold. There are apparently near the top of the Rigi some areas where the rock gives a striped or layered appearance. But actually, you are already familiar with this when you look into the world of pasta—think rigatoni. Even moreso, consider the versions of ziti or penne that have ridges along their sides and are therefore called ziti rigati or penne rigate, “ridged ziti” or “ridged penne”. And so we have die Rigi. (Didn’t I say language and travel blend?)

There is a Bergbahn—mountain railway—that climbs the Rigi (actually, two). It is the oldest Bergbahn of Switzerland (1871), but even more impressively, the first Bergbahn in Europe. That’s good, but no prize, and at this point I will refer the reader to the Mount Washington Cog Railway (2006/12) in New Hampshire, which opened for business in 1869 and is the oldest cog railway in the world. It also climbs a little higher than the Rigibahn, but its cars remain in antique style, while all European ones are constantly modernized and totally up-to-date. I said in that 2006 entry that I’d be getting to ride the Rigibahn, and it took two years to do it. However, I have since noted in Beverly’s travel diary that we DID ride the Rigibahn, but—it’s just one of those things—I have absolutely no recollection of doing so, so this time will seem like a new experience!

That entry also says that the Mt Washington Cog has a maximum grade of 37.41%, which is formidable, but the average is only 25%. It also says that the Rigibahn has a maximum of 25%, which I can corroborate, since its climb impresses, but does not shock.

In 1871, the first Rigibahn (“Vitznau-Rigibahn”) was built on the south side of the Rigi, from Vitznau (FITS.now) on the Vierwaldstättersee to Rigi-Kaltbad, most of the way up, then extended to the summit in 1873. In 1875, another was built on the north side, from Arth (ART), the Arth-Rigibahn. I rode both, one up, and one down.

There is a long history of people traveling to the top of the Rigi. The traditional purpose is to stay overnight and watch the sunrise over the Vierwaldstättersee (see Overture to William Tell: Dawn). Brahms traveled to the top, as did Goethe. Victor Hugo came, and Mark Twain also made a point to do so on his trip to Switzerland.

My personal pilgrimage to the Rigi began, as mentioned earlier, at the bridge over the Reuss in Luzern. A few steps to the right and I was at the pier at the railroad station, and I got on the steamer leaving shortly. It was a perfect summer day as we pulled away from Luzern and watched it shrink behind us, with the Rigi growing in front of us. The steamer made several stops along the lake, on both sides, then pulled in to Weggis under the Rigi, where there’s a cable car up to Rigi-Kaltbad, and then into Vitznau, before proceeding further along the lake.

Since everything is so coordinated, I was able to buy the Bergbahn ticket (50% discount with the Swiss Pass) right on the steamer. But as I got off in Vitznau I did a foolish thing. I asked an official where I could find the Bahn, thinking it might connect a few blocks away. Silly me. He indicated to follow the crowd around the edge of the pier building, and there I could already see the tracks in the street. Didn’t I actually believe that everything was coordinated in Switzerland? I now suspect that if you started to sit down somewhere in the middle of the street, the earth would open and a park bench would rise up to meet you halfway. Well, maybe things aren’t quite THAT coordinated, but you get the point.

Let’s get the technology clear, including the German and English designations. A Bergbahn is any mountain railway, often narrow gauge, such as one meter. It needn’t have any special technology about it, such as the Bergbahn over the Bernina Pass (see below), which is just a regular train.

But usually there are steep grades, and the friction of the wheels on the tracks isn’t sufficient, so a Zahnradbahn, or cog or rack railway is used. (Since it’s a cog under the engine that engages the rack on the ground, in English you can call it using either word.) This rack is a special center track with gear teeth along the top. The special engines have a single gear below, a “cog”. The cog grips the rack and the result is a very firm ride, with the train pulling itself up steep grades by clinging to the rack. Under these circumstances, the regular tracks just provide guidance. This is also called a Zahnradbahn (“Zahn” is tooth, “Rad” is wheel, and a Zahnrad, or toothed wheel, is a gear, so Zahnradbahn corresponds directly to cog railway.

Sometimes the cog-to-rack connection has to be continuous, from beginning to end, but the route is not always steep all the time. Anyway, using the cog means slower forward progress. My train to Meiringen the next day only connected to the rack toward the end, and the train up to Zermatt kept on connecting and disconnecting, as needed. You feel a slight change in movement when this happens.

A Zahnradbahn is a regular train otherwise, and powers itself. Understand the difference from a funicular, where the car has no power, but is just dragged along. To use again the illustration I’ve used in the past, a funicular is like a child whose mittens are attached to a string around his neck so he doesn’t lose them. Pull one mitten down and the other rises to the top, and vice versa. A funicular lies against a mountainside and goes up and down, in tandem with its sister car, as the cable is run in one direction or the other. Because a funicular is lying against the mountainside, its cars are always stepped in shape, like stadium seating, with the row behind always being higher.

So, the Rigibahn is a cog railway. Taking the few steps from the steamer, we were on board, and off we went. It started almost as a tram through the higher levels of Vitznau on the hillside, then rose quickly, turning to the left, and you could see Vitznau and the Vierwaldstättersee falling behind below you.

I found this ride on YouTube: Rigibahn at Vitznau Note the following:

Up (literally) in the countryside, you smelled the hay, and saw the cows in the field, with their cowbells, as you see here on YouTube: Cowbells on the Rigi That happens everywhere in Switzerland, no matter how high you go: here below, also on top of the Rigi, and, incredibly, on the very steep slopes of Pilatus. We stopped at a couple of resorts on the way up, including the well-known Rigi-Kaltbad, taking on or dropping off hikers, and then went all the way to Rigi-Kulm.

The Swiss have adopted several words of their own, and one of them is “die Kulm”. The German words for a mountaintop or a peak are Gipfel or Spitze, but the Swiss frequently use the word “Kulm”. It derives from the Latin word for peak, culmus, and should be very familiar to English speakers as being part of the word CULMination, which also refers to a high point.

The Bergbahn stopped at the Rigi-Kulm station at the top, at the appropriately named Hotel Kulm, where many were out having lunch on the terrace in the sun. I joined those who walked uphill a little further for about ten minutes to the actual Kulm itself, with its superb clear-day views in every direction.

The main rail line coming here is Zürich to Zug to Luzern, and from the north side of the Rigi I could see right down to Zug perfectly, situated on the Zuger See, which looked like a pond from this height. It was like looking at a Google map, or looking down from a plane. The view west was even better, since you looked down on the X of the Vierwaldstättersee, with Küssnacht on the near arm, Luzern on the next, and the Pilatus looming over Luzern. The view downward was just perfect, and clear as could be. To the south, you had lost the view straight down to Vitznau once you came up the mountain, and all you saw was a chasm, at the bottom of which would be the lake, but straight ahead in the distance you saw the snow-covered peaks. Be aware that northern Switzerland around Zürich does not have impressive mountains, they get better down about Luzern, but the concentration of huge mountains runs along the southern strip of Switzerland, and that’s what we were seeing here. The only thing is, in my opinion it’s nice to see, but it’s no big deal. What you see looking south from left to right in the distance is white sawteeth going on and on. A tablet tries to explain which sawtooth is which of dozens of mountains, but it’s hard to tell. I knew that three of them were the famous trio Eiger-Mönch-Jungfrau near Interlaken, but I really couldn’t tell which was which. At this distance, it’s nice to see, but fails to impress me for more than momentarily. I preferred to eyeball Luzern right below me in the west.

This rather good panorama was on YouTube: Rigi Panorama

I then took the Arth-Rigibahn down to the busy rail station at Arth-Goldau. It leaves Rigi-Kulm right next to the other one, but turns early and goes down the back of the mountain through forests with waterfalls, some of which back up right next to the line, but is all in all less impressive than the other side. This Bahn then crosses perpendicularly the rail lines at the railroad station, and you simply go downstairs for your connection. I came back on this route to try it, and to avoid having to take the boat at Vitznau again, since I wanted to move along. The train was back in Luzern in no time.

Der Pilatus   It was early afternoon, and I had decided to add the Pilatusbahn to today’s schedule. I could have first taken a boat to Alpnachstad, then crossed through the rail station to the Pilatusbahn, since all are grouped together, but having already had my boat ride for the day I took the suburban train to Alpnachstad directly and then crossed the road to the Pilatusbahn.

The Pilatus (pi.LAH.tus) got its name because of superstition. In the middle ages the mountain was believed to have been haunted by the spirit of Pontius Pilate, hence the name. Only when I looked up at the mountain from the center of Luzern on this trip and saw its forbidding demeanor did I realize how superstition could have had that strong an effect in the people’s feelings toward this hovering mountain.

I have been on numerous Bergbahnen, including Zahnradbahnen. I have been on numerous funiculars. Nothing prepared me for the ride on the Pilatusbahn, which was without doubt a major highlight of this trip to Switzerland. I wish I had done it before, and I’m ready to do it again someday. How invigorating. How thrilling. The ride was magnificent.

I was totally unaware of what was so special about the Pilatusbahn, particularly given the fact that I had just come off both of the Rigibahnen a couple of hours earlier. What I did know was that the Pilatusbahn dated from 1889, so it was younger than the Mt Washington Cog (1869) and both of the Rigibahnen (1871-1875), but a centenarian nonetheless (actually 119 years old, but like all the others except for Mt Washington, totally modernized). So what could be so special? I’ll tell you what, and if you ever had disdain for 19C technology as being out of date, disabuse yourself right now of such calumny.

Before I describe my breathtaking ascent of Mt Pilatus, let me analyze the situation. As a matter of fact, it wasn’t until two weeks later, pondering that ascent while on the Queen Mary 2 that it struck me. You have to consider the Pilatusbahn as a hybrid, the only hybrid Bergbahn I’ve ever seen or experienced.

The Pilatusbahn is the steepest Zahnradbahn in the world, achieving inclines of 48%. Well, that’s going to be steeper than the Rigibahn’s 25%, but the Rigibahn, like all other Zahnradbahnen uses regular rail cars. Even Mt Washington, with its steeper ascent, uses regular rail cars pushed by a steam locomotive on a triangular undercarriage, which keeps the boiler level in the engine.

It’s only funiculars that, clinging onto their cable, are dragged up the side of a steep mountain, so that’s why they have to have the stadium-seating cars, right?

Well, that’s what I had thought, and it wasn’t until two weeks later that I realized that what I was getting onto was like a “funicular gone wild”. It was NOT a funicular, but the slope was such that this Zahnradbahn was the first and only I’ve been on that had a funicular-style, stadium-seating car. You had to walk up steps alongside the car to enter compartments at high, medium, and lower levels. Then, unlike a staid, stolid funicular, this Bahn was ready to take on the world and seemingly go anywhere, zigzagging up the mountain.

As we left, I had a distinct feeling of “upwardness” that you don’t get on normal trains. Consider this. A train moving on level ground has a grade of 0°. An elevator or lift going straight up goes at 90°. Split the difference between a train and an elevator and you’re at 45°. This Bahn bettered that at 48°, and angle that was almost uniformly continuous up the mountain.

The best way I can describe this ascent involves distinguishing between the actual slope and the perceived slope--let’s call it the emotional slope. This cog railway that was masquerading as a funicular seemed to be going straight up, that was my emotional reaction. I felt like a fly climbing a wall. Don’t tell me it was only 48°--we were going for the sky! The perceived feeling was that of a gymnast climbing a rope. You almost wanted to reach out to grab at branches in order to help the ascent. It was breathtaking.

You never leveled out. It was always a matter of “climbing the wall”. At one point the driver pointed out one or two earlier cars ascending what seemed the sheer wall ahead of us. It was like sloped funicular cars running amok. Shouldn’t they stay attached to their cable? As we proceeded, we again saw those Swiss cows walking along the tiny meadows on the side, cowbells clinking, and if you turned around, you saw the Vierwaldstättersee rapidly sinking into the earth. This continued for the ascent of 4.6 kilometers / 2.9 miles on a narrow gauge that was under a meter; it was 800 mm or 2’ 7.5”.

This “fly climbing the wall” ascent is really quite spectacular, and you may imagine that, with grades such as this, a regular cog and rack is not enough. An engineer named Locher came up with an improvement, called the Locher system. The basis of it is, if one cog-and-rack connection is good, two are better. Normally, the weight of the train holds the vertical cog in place on top of the rack, but what about those steep grades? Could there be slippage? What Locher devised is a rack whose teeth are not on top. Instead there are two sets of teeth, one on EACH side of the rack. The engine then has two HORIZONTAL cogs—I would imagine like an electric floor waxer has two horizontal wheels side by side—that must hold the rack in something of a death grip. To me it would seem that this system could climb anything. Well, actually, it did, it went up the side of Mount Pilatus. What a ride. I’m still breathless. And again remember, although new equipment is used, this is 1889 technology.

Even the upper station isn’t horizontal, but instead looks like stepped upper funicular station. The Pilatusbahn shares a building up at Pilatus-Kulm with the cable car I’ll discuss in a moment, and there are two hotels. There are three pinnacles you can walk up to. The one that’s officially the highest, at 2132 meters / 7000 feet was a half-hour’s walk. I chose one of the close ones, the Oberhaupt, a ten-minute hike up a hill, which got me to 2106 meters / 6913 feet, which was close enough. You had very close to a 360° view. To the south, once again, you saw the tiny white sawtooth summits of all those snow-covered mountains I’d be getting to in a few days. To the west was a view over a number of Swiss lakes I didn’t know the names of, but which looked like potholes from this height. To the east was die Rigi, but the best was the view to the north, right down to the center of Luzern, on the lake, so far below. Remember, Mount Pilatus is really in a southern suburb of Luzern.

I had two ways to get down. I could have backtracked down the Pilatusbahn, but instead, at the last moment, decided to take the cable car. Doing this circle route of Mount Pilatus is called locally taking the Goldene Rundfahrt, the Golden Round Trip, up one way (either one) and down the other. It’s another reflection of the marvelous coordination of travel connections in Switzerland.

I will here state a travel prejudice. I don’t think cable cars are big deals. That is to say, everyone should try one once, and you do get a nice, breathtaking view downwards, but beyond that, it’s about as much fun as taking a bus, and I’ve already discussed my low opinion of buses. But I had seen what I wanted, and the afternoon was moving along, so I returned this route.

The cable car descent (or ascent) here is in two parts, so a person can experience both styles of cable car as it turns out. The first one is the large-cabin style gondola, and about forty people crowded in shoulder-to-shoulder as the car swooped downward at a steep angle suddenly—and quite quietly—into nothingness. Only when the car rolled over a tower did you feel a jostle. Still—my prejudice—it was about as much fun as hanging like laundry from a clothesline. At the intermediate station we changed to the second part, tiny cars that seated four people, and went much more horizontally to the Luzern suburb of Kriens, where you take about an eight-minute hike to city bus # 1 for a 15-minute ride to—where else—the railroad station. I’m satisfied with having done the Goldene Rundfahrt, but if I ever go to the top of the Pilatus again—and I wouldn’t mind doing so—I’d avoid the clothesline route entirely and do a round trip on the Pilatusbahn, especially given that it’s such an exceptional trip.

The Travel Cynic speaketh again: if you pile one rock on top of another in Switzerland, when you come back the next day, someone will have probably built a cable car to the top. Most cable cars do bring you to places with great mountain views, but, since great mountain views in Switzerland are a dime a dozen, be cynical about the need to take too many cable cars. Interlaken, Zermatt, Sankt Moritz, simply bristle with cable cars that go to the top of EVERYWHERE, and there is really no need to go everywhere. Cable cars are just glorified bus routes; try one, maybe try two, especially if you’ve never hung yourself out on a clothesline and want the experience. I will, however, give full credit for the spectacular technology involved in building and operating a cable car.

This is a video from YouTube that shows the Goldene Rundfahrt in the direction I happened to take it: Pilatus: Goldene Rundfahrt

Luzern   By this time it was late afternoon, but all I had planned to do was to stroll once again around the Altstadt (Old Town) in Luzern, and then go to dinner. I walked first up to the Löwendenkmal / Lion Monument at the north edge of downtown, then returned to the center to complete a busy, but very pleasant day.

LÖWENDENKMAL It’s well known that historically, the Swiss, like the Hessians in Germany, were among those who provided mercenaries to other countries. The reason it’s well known is that, to this day, the Swiss Guard, in historic costumes, continues to provide symbolic protection to the Pope in Rome. [To this day, the largest religious group of any kind in Switzerland are the Roman Catholics, at 42%; by far the largest Protestant group, at 33%, is the Swiss Reformed Church, going back to Zwingli and others, including Calvin.] In any case, it was the Swiss Guards who were protecting the royals in Paris during the French Revolution, and 850 were killed, either during the storming of the Tuileries in 1792, or by being guillotined soon afterward. An officer who survived proposed building the Löwendenkmal / Lion Monument, and it was completed in 1821. It’s particularly unusual in that it’s carved directly into the exposed “living rock” on a hillside in the park. It’s about 9 meters / 29 feet long. [The four Presidents’ heads on Mount Rushmore are carved into living rock in the same manner, although on a MUCH larger scale.] The sculpture portrays a dying lion with a spear in its left flank, but with its right paw continuing to protect a shield with the fleur de lys. Michelin tells me that, when Mark Twain saw the Löwendenkmal, he proclaimed it “the saddest piece of stone in the whole world”.

Here on YouTube is the Lion Monument: Löwendenkmal. Freeze it at 0:15 or 0:38 to look more carefully. Try to find the fleur de lys.

ALTSTADT Luzern is at the point of outflow from the Vierwaldstättersee, via die Reuss (ROISS). The Altstadt is on the north bank of the Reuss and a stroll through its historic squares and buildings is a pleasant way to end the day. There are several bridges (Brücken) over the Reuss, including two historic, covered wooden ones, that have become the symbol of the town. After walking through the Altstadt on the north bank, I crossed the narrow wooden Spreuerbrücke (1408), in the middle of which is a tiny chapel (1568). After seeing the sights on the south bank, I returned via the longer Kapellbrücke, which dates from the early 14C. It’s longer, since it, oddly, crosses the Reuss at a very steep angle, and measures 200 meters / 656 feet. Attached to its center is the octagonal stone Wasserturm / Water Tower of 1300. In the rafters under the roof are many historical paintings. Like many traditional Swiss houses, which have flowerboxes, usually with geraniums in them, under the windows, contrasting with the dark wood of the building, there are flowerboxes, geraniums and all, along the outside of the two Luzern wooden bridges. I was surprised to read that a fire in 1993 destroyed a good part of the Kapellbrücke, so much of what I saw this time was a restoration of what I had seen in the past.

Right off the Kapellbrücke and back on the north bank, I had dinner at an outside café. The scene was idyllic. Behind me, in the distance, was die Rigi. Die Reuss and die Kapellbrücke were to my left, and seemingly right behind them loomed der Pilatus. If you’re not familiar with the term Alpenglow, let me explain. It's a half-German, half-English word used in English, from German Alpenglühen. When the sun is setting and everything around you is already in twilight, it’s possible that a high mountain (not necessarily an Alp) might still catch the sun’s rays. When it does, it’s spectacular, and this is Alpenglow. I’m pleased to say that, to accompany my dinner in the twilight, der Pilatus was surrounded by Alpenglow.

I found on YouTube this run through Luzern: Luzern.

CUISINE I need to make a comment about Swiss cuisine, in reverse order of preference. I’ll make it here, since this evening in Luzern I had my favorite, Zürcher Geschnetzeltes, but unfortunately, they didn’t have any Rösti to accompany it. Not to worry. I had it twice more before I left, including on the train at the end, leaving Zürich overnight to Hamburg.

I like cheese fondue, but it’s usually prepared for two people or more, and is difficult to get when dining alone. Later, in Zermatt, I found a restaurant that specializes in fondue, and regularly served single portions. I ordered one with onion and bacon.

I very much like Rösti. It’s simply coarsely grated potatoes, crisply fried together into a circle the shape of the bottom of the frying pan. It’s usually served on the side with other dishes, especially Zürcher Geschnezeltes (below), but this trip I learned about Rösti as a main course. You can order it with various toppings, such as mushrooms and onions, with gravy. I had Rösti twice this way.

My favorite is Zürcher Geschnetzeltes, which requires a bit of explanation. It’s a marvelous dish of sliced veal cutlets in a cream sauce with mushrooms and onions, and is exceptional. I want to explain the name in this manner. A Schnitzel (based on schneiden, to cut) is a cutlet, usually veal, but also pork or chicken. The word appears as part of Wiener Schnitzel, a breaded veal cutlet, literally “Viennese cutlet”. Schnitzel changes to –schnetzel- in “geschnetzelt”, a past participle literally meaning “schnitzeled”. Add –es to form a noun, and Geschnetzeltes would translate as “that which has been schnitzeled”, and, as the name says, is a specialty of Zürich. Now forget all that, and order Zürcher Geschnetzeltes the next time you see it on a menu. But at least now, you’ll be able to pronounce it.

Sherlock Holmes Dies!   I shall hereby divide readers into two very distinct groups. One group will wonder why on earth I’m bringing up Sherlock Holmes, of all things, in a discussion of Switzerland. The other group, more fully aware of the Sherlock Holmes canon, will suspect that I’ve found Meiringen, and will be eager to ask if I also found Reichenbach Falls, or even actually VISITED them. While the answer to this second group of readers is Yes, I shall not be preaching here to the converted, but shall tell the story from the beginning. This will involve a HUGE digression at this point that will involve Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, William Gillette, Basil Rathbone, Jeremy Brett, and Vasiliy Livanov. Two of these names were only minimally known to me, if at all, before the current research for this series of essays, but all these people are interesting. In addition, we’ll also once again plunge back in a bit to Russian and the Cyrillic alphabet, and, for good measure, as icing on the cake, we’ll include a bit the Greek alphabet. I do hope this side trip will be diverting, after which, I promise, we’ll get back to Meiringen and the Reichenbach Falls.

SIR ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE The author of the Sherlock Holmes canon, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1859-1930), had been trained as a physician, a profession in which he was not particularly successful. Many people see Doctor Watson as Conan Doyle’s alter ego as narrator of the Holmes stories. By the way, how he came upon his double surname is unclear, since his father’s name was just Doyle, and his mother had been a Foley. He was also a “serious” writer, and was prouder of his accomplishments in historical and other writings than in crime novels. In fact, he apparently was knighted for his writings on the Boer War, and not because of Holmes, a fact that surprised me, given that today he’s world famous because of Holmes and no one really knows anything else he accomplished. [This reminds me of Sir Arthur Sullivan who wanted to be remembered for his “serious” music and not for the Gilbert & Sullivan comic operas, but we remember him today for songs like “Three Little Maids” and “A Modern Major General”, and no one remembers that he also wrote “Onward Christian Soldiers”.]

In any case, in 1887, when he would have been 28, to make a little money to supplement his meager income, he wrote A Study in Scarlet, the first Sherlock Holmes story, which was published in a magazine, and was quite successful. This was not yet The Strand Magazine, where, as is well known, later Holmes short stories would be published, all very successful as well.

But after just four years, even with all the success with Holmes, Conan Doyle had had enough of him, and in 1891, famously decided to kill him off, so he wouldn’t have to continue the stories and could concentrate on his “serious” work. It is at this point where the scene shifts from London to Switzerland.

The English have been going on holiday to Switzerland since at least 1865, when an Englishman led a group of men to climb the Matterhorn in Zermatt. Throughout the Victorian period, towns in Switzerland, such as Zermatt, Meiringen, Interlaken, Sankt Moritz, Davos, had an influx of English visitors on a regular basis. To some extent this was the impetus for modern tourism in Switzerland. Meiringen even had enough English visitors to have built a tiny Anglican Church. Conan Doyle stayed in the Hotel du Sauvage (1880, and still there), next to that church, and was well familiar from his holidays there with the town, and with nearby Reichenbach Falls.

Therefore, in The Final Problem (which in the long run turned out not to be final at all), Conan Doyle has Holmes and Watson travel to several locations in Switzerland (detailed on a map in the museum in Meiringen), in pursuit of his archenemy, Professor Moriarty, the “Napoleon of crime”. They end up in Meiringen, and stay, appropriately, at the Englischer Hof, a pseudonym Conan Doyle uses for the Hotel du Sauvage. In pursuit of Moriarty, they go up into the hills to Reichenbach Falls, at which point a messenger arrives calling Watson back to town. At this point, Holmes and Moriarty meet, struggle, and both fall down into the abyss at the falls. When Watson returns, he deduces that, since neither of the two came back down the only path, they both have died. In this manner, Conan Doyle felt he was finally rid of the bother of Holmes.

When The Final Problem was published, I would assume Conan Doyle couldn’t have anticipated the outcry. The public didn’t want to see a popular hero killed off. There are reports that people in London wore black armbands mourning Holmes. Publishers, who realized the popularity of Holmes, thought of the lost profits.

Just as I was surprised in the Livingstone/Stanley story, that an American publication, the New York Herald, was so involved, I was also surprised to find that not only The Strand Magazine in the UK, but also Collier’s Weekly in the USA, urged Conan Doyle to continue the Sherlock Holmes stories for a generous salary.

With all the intense pressure to revive his famous character, in 1901, ten years after the “death” in Meiringen, he wrote the novel The Hound of the Baskervilles in the form of a prequel, setting it before the “death”. Finally, in 1903, twelve years after the “death”, Conan Doyle revived Holmes definitively in The Adventure of the Empty House, the first of 13 stories in the appropriately named The Return of Sherlock Holmes. These 13 stories were set starting in 1894, leaving the period 1891-1894 unexplained. This is referred to by Sherlockian enthusiasts as The Great Hiatus, and is the subject of intense speculation and analysis. (Do not underestimate Sherlockian enthusiasts—see below.)

In this first new short story, we find that Holmes had actually survived (although Moriarty had died), had climbed up the cliff and not down the path to the point where Watson would return. Once Watson had come again and gone, he came down and went “to explore the Himalayas” to avoid his enemies (henchmen of Moriarty) and to protect Watson. You may find this explanation rather flimsy, but don’t stand in the path of oncoming Sherlockian enthusiasts, since this explanation is part of the original canon and is therefore considered gospel.

Conan Doyle then continued for another quarter-century. All the Holmes stories that he wrote himself (and certainly not including those written by others later on), are referred to as the Holmes canon. Either something is in the canon—or not. The canon consists of 60 stories made up of 56 short stories and 4 novels. I find it very interesting that only 28 of these were written before the “death”, while a full 32, that is, more than half, were written afterward. Conan Doyle never made the mistake again of having Holmes die. The official word is that he eventually retired from London to Sussex and became an entomologist and keeps bees.

We’ve discussed other fictional characters, such as Don Quijote and Faust, but they don’t have anything like the International Sherlock Holmes Society with 200,000 members. In London there was for many years a bank secretary (see below) who responded to the many letters Holmes received at 221b Baker Street. At the museum in Meiringen is a sample letter saying something like “Mr Holmes has asked me to thank you for your letter …”. It is possible that many people are convinced Holmes is still alive (still? he never was!) and living as a Sussex beekeeper. After all, if he were dead, why would his secretary keep on answering letters? Sherlock Holmes is therefore a man who never actually lived—but has not yet died.

WILLIAM GILLETTE I had never heard of William Gillette (1853-1937), and suspect most readers haven’t either, which is a comment on how quickly fame dissipates. I first came across his name while traveling (how else?). Beverly and I often would go to East Haddam on the Connecticut River to the Goodspeed Opera House (they do preeminent revivals of musicals). We also sailed on our cruise of New England islands out of East Haddam. On our visits there, we found that nearby was a building with a beautiful view down on the river—and up from it--called Gillette Castle, built in 1913 and given to the State of Connecticut in 1943 to become Gillette Castle State Park (Gillette was also born in Connecticut). The building is of interest of itself, but it also includes a collection of Holmesiana. Why? The man who built the house had been the foremost interpreter of Sherlock Holmes on the American stage. I never went any more deeply into it than that, since there have been lots of people who’ve portrayed Holmes on the stage, movies, radio and television. Then I began researching the subject more deeply for this essay, and I am now amazed to find that Gillette seems to have had more influence on the character of Holmes than anyone other than Conan Doyle. Here’s how this developed.

Once Conan Doyle had “killed off” Holmes in 1891 I would presume he regretted it, since he started to need money again, in general, and particularly because he wanted to build a house. For additional income, he decided to write a 5-act play about Holmes and Professor Moriarty. It apparently didn’t work out well and needed extensive rewriting. At that time, 1897, the successful American playwright, director, and actor William Gillette was performing one of his own plays to critical acclaim in London, and it was suggested to Conan Doyle that he contact Gillette to do the rewrite. Gillette adapted it considerably, with permission, using several stories from the canon to write a 4-act play called “Sherlock Holmes”. When Gillette turned the manuscript over to Conan Doyle, Gillette appeared dressed as Holmes. Conan Doyle approved the script, and they became lifelong friends.

This play was very successful, and William Gillette played Sherlock Holmes over 1300 times, which is close to a record for one actor playing the same character. Gillette was without doubt the definitive Holmes of his day, and played the role for over thirty years, last in 1932, five years before his death. He also made a silent film of the play, and performed it twice on radio.

In this period of time, it was Gillette, not Conan Doyle, who formulated so many standard images and props that we associate with Holmes. Gillette used the deerstalker cap, and the cloak. While illustrations in the canon showed Holmes smoking a pipe with a straight stem, Gillette changed that to a curved briar pipe, most likely so that people in the front rows of the theater could better see his face. He also instituted the standard Holmes props of the magnifying glass and the syringe, and furthered the use of the violin. One begins to wonder how much of Holmes is Conan Doyle and how much is Gillette, when so much of these things Gillette used became synonymous with Holmes. It may strike one how much Gillette looks like Holmes, but in reality, do realize that it’s our image of Holmes that looks like Gillette.

So many “famous” quotes never really existed. We recently discussed “Doctor Livingstone, I presume?” and its tenuous touch with reality. Nowhere in the film “Casablanca” does the line “Play it again, Sam” appear (Ingrid Bergman says “Play it, Sam, play it”), even though Woody Allen wrote a successful Broadway play with the famous (non)quote as its title. And then we come to “Elementary, my dear Watson”.

The most “famous” Holmes quote is not to be found anywhere in the canon. But does that mean we reject it? No, just like we don’t reject the Casablanca (non)quote. They are part of the evolved cultural legacy surrounding their subject, even though they’re not authentic (!!!).

So if it isn’t in the canon, where did it come from? When we round up the Casablanca “usual suspects” we consider Gillette, but that’s only partly true. The phrase that Gillette formulated in his play was “Elementary, my dear fellow”. It was another portrayer of Holmes, one who made the first Holmes talking motion picture, who altered Gillette’s phrase to “Elementary, my dear Watson”, and later on, Basil Rathbone (below) popularized this version further.

Once again, in addition to the New York Herald and Collier’s Weekly, it’s interesting to see the American influence here. Just visualize how much of Holmes is Conan Doyle, but how much is Gillette.

Another comment on how ephemeral fame is. Given his fame during the first third of the 20C, who knows William Gillette today? Probably just those that go visit Gillette Castle. Beyond that is the problem of stage actors. Those that have their work recorded on film or videotape are more likely to be remembered, while even today, those that are in the theater are in danger of having their work forgotten. Sic transit gloria mundi.

But fear not. We shall at least listen to William Gillette on YouTube. William Gillette as Sherlock Holmes (The static clears after the beginning.)

BASIL RATHBONE There have been many interpreters of Holmes on the stage and screen—Guinness World Records calls Holmes the most portrayed movie character, with over 70 actors portraying him in over 200 films--but the definitive one after Gillette is Basil Rathbone. I first became acquainted with Holmes by watching old Basil Rathbone films on television. He and Nigel Bruce as Watson made fourteen enormously popular Holmes films between 1939 and 1945. The first two, both from 1939, were “The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes” and “The Hound of the Baskervilles”, both set in Victorian times, but the remaining were very oddly made contemporary, taking great liberties with the canon, and having modern villains, such as the Nazis. Non-canonical as these latter ones may be, they continued to have great influence. Here’s a clip on YouTube from the 1939 “Adventures of Sherlock Holmes”: Basil Rathbone as Sherlock Holmes

JEREMY BRETT It is a common consensus that Jeremy Brett (1933-1995) was the definitive Sherlock Holmes for his generation—our current generation--just as Basil Rathbone and William Gillette had been for theirs. It is also my personal opinion that Jeremy Brett is the definitive Sherlock Holmes of all time. Any doubts about the affection held for him and his portrayal of Holmes will be dissipated by reviewing the dedications to him on YouTube and on other sites reached through Google, compounded by his early and sudden death at age 61. His is another example, as with Gillette and Rathbone, of one role taking over his career. Few remember him for his other roles, including singing ones. Who remembers today that Jeremy Brett, the definitive Holmes, played lovelorn Freddie Eynsford-Hill in the 1964 film version of “My Fair Lady”, singing “On the Street Where You Live”? (OK, his singing voice was dubbed in that case, but he could still sing.) Brett played Holmes quite distinctively, as a moody and quirky soul, using odd inflections and raised eyebrows, but that seemed to reflect the depth of the character.

Between 1984 and 1994 he made 41 episodes for Grenada Television, broadcast in four series. There had been plans to film the entire canon, which were cut short by his illnesses and sudden death by heart failure compounded by his incredibly heavy smoking. His New York Times obituary called him the “quintessential Holmes” whose characterization was “breathtakingly analytical”. It was also pure canon. You won’t find any instances of “Elementary, my dear Watson” in his portrayals.

Watch him on YouTube in the opening scenes of “The Greek Interpreter”: Jeremy Brett as Sherlock Holmes Note that the Grenada Television theme music features the violin, typical of Holmes.

Aside from his heart condition, Brett was bipolar (manic-depressive), and was hospitalized frequently during the years of the filming. Toward the end of his life he acknowledged his condition publicly and spoke in forums about it. It is often thought that Holmes’s mood swings and quirkiness were meant to be an indication of Holmes being bipolar as well, and Brett’s interpretation reaches out to that.

The following on YouTube is an excerpt from a BBC broadcast, whose title is a takeoff on that of the first Holmes story. It quite interestingly discusses both Jeremy Brett and manic depression: “A Study in Sherlock” (BBC)

VASILIY LIVANOV Of the many portrayers of Holmes, I’ve discussed the three principal ones over time. But they’re all within the English-speaking world from which the canon comes. For non-English speakers to follow the action they need subtitles on English-language films and videos. Shortly we’ll see some subtitles in Greek. But I’ve really been quite amazed while doing this research to see the extent to which Holmes has become international.

In this regard, we need to mention the Russians, who have a great regard for Holmes and the Victorian period in general. On that basis, an extremely popular Holmes series was produced in Russian and broadcast on Russian television (at the time, Soviet Union television) between 1979 and 1986, in five series totaling eleven episodes. The director, when casting the actors, was guided by the drawings illustrating Conan Doyle’s original works.

Cast as Шерлок Холмс / Sherlok Kholms was the actor, playwright, and director Василий Ливанов / Vasiliy Livanov (born 1935), [pronounced va.SI.liy li.VA.naf], and cast as Доктор Ватсон / Doktor Vatson was Виталий Соломин / Vitaliy Solomin (1941-2002 [stroke]) [pronounced vi.TA.liy sa.LO.min]. Remember that unstressed O sounds like an A. Here are the names written in isolation, for closer inspection:

I invite the reader to review the Cyrillic alphabet in 2005/5-6-7, or at very least to make an attempt at reconciling the letters now ad hoc in corresponding words above, which use only 16 letters, anyway. Compose your own summary. “Doktor Vatson” is an easy place to start. You will get much more out of this discussion if you can at least recognize the letters that are almost exactly the same, and even a few others.

Livanov’s portrayal is widely regarded as one of the best, and most believable, especially in the former Soviet Union. In 2000 the English press voted both Ливанов and Соломин to be the best portrayers, but one source said “on the continent” and another said “in Europe”, which in British usage usually refers just to the continent, so it’s unclear if English-speaking portrayers were included in that assessment. However, I’ve read that the largest Holmes portrait in the Sherlock Holmes Museum in London is of Livanov. One thing is quite clear: Livanov was a favorite Holmes of both Margaret Thatcher and Queen Elizabeth, and he was awarded an OBE (Order of the British Empire), Second Degree for his work.

Listen and compare for yourself on YouTube. Part of their TV series included THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES, and here are its opening scenes. Don’t worry, there are English subtitles: Vasiliy Livanov as Sherlock Holmes

I find the settings and portrayals quite good, but the raucous laughter doesn’t work for me. Watson at 5:18 is bad enough, but Holmes at 2:46 is totally out of character.

You may recall the discussion that there’s a historical relationship between B and V as letters and sounds, which I will review below, but suffice it to say that the name Васил(ий) / Vasil(iy) corresponds to the name Basil. There is great irony that two principal portrayers of Holmes, Livanov and Rathbone, essentially have the same first name.

Another curiosity involves fictional characters. I earlier mentioned both Faust and Don Quixote / Don Quijote in addition to Holmes. As it turns out, in 1997 Vasiliy Livanov wrote, directed, and starred in a film about Дон Кихот / Don Kikhot.

Let’s now proceed with the language a bit more. Practice reading this:

Now go look for it at 0:46.

We’ve mentioned in the past that Russian never developed articles (the, a) and proves that they’re not necessary. It’s also a language with cases, where adding an ending indicating the genitive case is like adding “of”. The word for “dog” is собака. Now try this:

This is pronounced sa.BA.ka bas.ker.VIL.ey. Note how two words suffice where English has five. Work with it, then go find it at 0:50.

Here’s a bit more of a challenge with a longer word. The word for “adventures” is приключения / priklyucheniya, pronounced pri.klyu.CHE.ni.ya. Also, while the genitive ending in the plural was –ей, in the singular (masculine) you simply use the –a to indicate “of”, and it goes on ALL the words affected:

You can go back and find this at 0:35.

The name of this website spelled in Cyrillic is Травелангуист. Work with it letter by letter. Now you’re on your own to figure out precisely what this would mean. You again should come up with five words in English for these two in Russian:

We’ve been dealing just with reading language, but we can do a bit of listening, too. Let’s discuss what we’ll be listening for. The word for “dear” is дорогой / dorogoy, pronounced da.ra.GOY. Go to 3:44 and listen for Holmes saying “Дорогой Ватсон”. Keep playing it until you can hear it clearly.

The word for “my” is мой / moy. Go to 4:29 and listen for Holmes saying “Мой дорогой Ватсон”.

We don’t have in this clip the whole sentence we’re looking for, but we can reconstruct it. Here’s the word элементарно / elementarno, pronounced e.le.men.TAR.na, whose meaning I hope you can guess. Listen at 5:08 for Элементарно, дорогой.

Lacking the whole sentence in this particular clip, but assuming it’s used elsewhere, it would be:

Enjoy playing with it.

We saw English subtitles on a Russian video, and let’s now look at Greek subtitles on an English one. First watch this rather interesting montage on YouTube of scenes showing Holmes deducing his results: “The Art of Deduction”. Since the first two scenes are familiar, you may want to move to the third and final one at 2:09.

Now we can begin experimenting. I do not speak, or even read, Greek, but that’s no reason to stop us. Most of us know a bit of the Greek alphabet. How else can you identify the academic honorary society Phi Beta Kappa, written ΦΒΚ, to say nothing of many fraternity and sorority names? Also, in math we use pi, π (as a capital, Π), and others such as sigma, usually in capital form: Σ. The one thing I will grant is that capital letters in Greek are more easily recognizable to most of us than lower case, π being the exception.

Go back to the last video, pause it at 0:04, and look at the Greek subtitle. The last words you hear are “Sherlock Holmes’ and the last text in the subtitle is:

And there we have it—something to work with. You perhaps can see some relationships already, but to simplify things, let’s put it all in upper case:

Try to identify, in order, sigma, epsilon, rho, lambda, omicron, kappa; then chi, omicron, lambda, mu, sigma. As in all alphabets including Latin and Cyrillic, there are variations in the Greek alphabet between upper and lower case with some letters, but not at all with others. The one point we can figure out is that, since Greek doesn’t have a “sh” sound (Russian does, and has the letter Ш to represent it), it uses just sigma, Σ, so the Greek version is: Serlok Kholms.

There is, of course, more than just mere playing around here in doing this. In the original discussion on Cyrillic in 2005, I pointed out that the Cyrillic alphabet was heavily derived from the Greek alphabet (given the environment of the Orthodox Church), and to a lesser extent from the Latin alphabet, plus a bit of Hebrew. Actually, it may be even less from the Latin alphabet than one realizes. Are the Russian capital letters T, K, O, M, for instance, easily recognized because of the Latin letters T, K, O, M, or are they really taken from Greek tau, kappa, omicron, mu (T, K, O, M)? Food for thought, including realizing some close three-way relationships among the three major European alphabets.

But a contrast between Cyrillic and Greek can be quite illustrative. Again, compare the two, all in capital letters. Come to your own conclusions in your comparisons.

Let’s complete this with Watson. When Russian is confronted with the English sound of W and the need to transcribe it into Cyrillic, there are two ways out. Most frequently, it yields, and totally changes it to a B (that it, V), so Watson appears as Ватсон. In the same way, if one goes online to Wikipedia, the Russian version is Википедия, and US President (Woodrow) Wilson appears as Вильсон (in toto, Вудро Вильсон). But there is another route, using a U (as in “rule”), in the form of the Cyrillic letter У. The name of the Florida city at the end of the Keys appears, therefore, in this second manner: Ки-Уэст.

Let’s take a look at what Greek seems to do, which is rather amazing. Go back to the last video and look at 2:44, where the subtitle shows Watson’s name. I’ll put it as is, then in all caps, and will add the Cyrillic version as comparison.

Here’s the surprise: Watson appears as Gouatson, or perhaps we can write it Gwatson. From the A onwards, it’s like the Russian, so let’s analyze what comes before that.

We seem to have a similar trick to what French does. We all know that the French word that sounds like “wi” is rendered “oui”, using the U sound (spelled OU) to fake a W sound before the I. Greek is doing the same thing here, using –ου- (omicron, upsilon) to fake a W before the alpha. I cannot explain the gamma (Γ) at the beginning, except that it might be common to have Greek words start with a GW- combination. However, this doesn’t seem to be universal, since President Wilson in Greek doesn’t need a gamma at the beginning, and appears as: Ουιλσον, in caps, ΟΘΙΛΣΟΝ, which is Ouilson, duplicating again the French “oui” trick, but without the gamma first.

Finally, here is the name of this website in the Greek alphabet. I’ll add it in Russian for comparison:

You see in the Greek version that the French “oui” trick is again necessary. As a matter of fact, in the lower case version you can even see “-ουι-” in Greek within the word. Also, it has to be realized that the Greek alphabet was established for Ancient Greek, and while the language changed into Modern Greek, the alphabet did not. I do know enough about Greek writing that there was no historical way, or need, to represent the NG sound in the Greek alphabet, since he hadn’t existed at the time, so an alternate spelling has developed in Modern Greek. NG is represented by two gammas (ΓΓ), which I’ve used above. This double-gamma looks like you’re writing GG, but it today represents NG. Finally, beta (B) in Ancient Greek changed from a B-sound to a V-sound in Modern Greek, so it is appropriately used above. As a matter of fact, the pronunciation in Modern Greek of the name of the letter beta is “vita”, with a clear V. This again also explains why Russian uses what looks like a beta (B) for its own V, and proves that Cyrillic adopted this and other letters from Greek AFTER the B to V change had taken place in Greek.

Meiringen   We have now taken a considerable detour from Switzerland, and it’s time to go back and get to Meiringen and der Reichenbachfall. However, I’m sure that now we’re all on the same page.

It’s less than an hour by train from Luzern to Meiringen, past an attractive lake and over a small pass. Still, I was surprised to find out the train turned out to be a Zahnradbahn, and as we descended into the valley toward Meiringen, you could hear and feel the cog engaging the rack. It was late on a Sunday morning and the town was pleasantly peaceful. Meiringen is the only stop I made this time around where I hadn’t stayed before, and it was an enjoyable experience. Just at the east end of the wide Bahnhofsplatz was the new Hotel Victoria—already a British reference—where I had booked. It was a very contemporary smaller hotel, low-key yet cutting edge, including in the restaurant.

I knew it was well-placed, being such a short, quiet walk from the station, and with the pleasant main street the parallel, one block away. I knew the Holmes museum was on the main street, but was totally surprised, when I walked out the side entrance to the hotel, to see the Sherlock Holmes museum right across the side street. It couldn’t have been closer. Here we should discuss both Holmes museums.

One of the most famous addresses in the world has never really existed, 221b Baker Street in London, where Holmes and Watson shared rooms. Where that address could have been on Baker Street was long ago replaced by a bank building. The bank received mail for Holmes, and was the entity that employed a secretary to answer Holmes letters. Some years ago, when Beverly and I went to Baker Street, the bank building was all there was to see. But there had been clamor over time for something more substantial to greet the many visitors that came there to see, essentially, nothing, and in 1990, the Sherlock Holmes Museum opened in London. I have not been back to Baker Street since, but now plan to visit the museum.

As I piece it together, the not-for-profit Sherlock Holmes International Society purchased for the museum a Georgian town house up the street at 239 Baker Street, which had been a boarding house from 1860 to 1936, so it did cover the Holmes period of 1881-1904. There was a long-running dispute with the bank to have the Holmes mail addressed to 221b to be delivered to the museum, but the bank refused. However, the bank vacated the premises in 2002, and the museum now gets the Holmes mail, and presumably answers it. The museum also uses the fictional address 221b, but only by special permission of the City of Westminster, part of Greater London. There must have been enough of a call to establish such a museum, since it today is the most popular PRIVATELY run museum in London. It is also the very first museum in the world to be dedicated to a fictional character.

At about the same time, Meiringen started to consider this literary heritage, and opened its Sherlock Holmes Museum the following year, in 1991, making it the second museum in the world dedicated to a fictional character, albeit the same one.

To be more accurate, a plaque in front of the museum states that the cornerstone was laid in 1987 on the occasion of a pilgrimage to Switzerland of the Sherlock Holmes Society of London in commemoration of the centenary of the publication in 1887 of the first Holmes story, A STUDY IN SCARLET. Then, in 1991, the centenary of the struggle at the falls in 1891, the museum was inaugurated under the patronage of both the Society and of Dame Jean Conan Doyle, the author’s daughter. Do realize, whatever your own feelings, how very seriously many people take this subject.

The small park on Meiringen’s main street, between my hotel and the Hotel du Sauvage (Conan Doyle’s “Englischer Hof”) has been renamed Conan Doyle Place, and a typical London red-black-white street sign actually says, in English, “Borough of Meiringen, Conan Doyle Place”. Near the road is the well-known statue of Holmes. It’s smallish, I’d guess 80% of full size, and down near the ground. Holmes is sitting on a large boulder, with pipe, deerstalker cap and cape, and is contemplating his upcoming visit to the falls. I am told that there are 60 tiny hints on the statue, each referring to one of the 60 stories in the canon. I did find one little symbol on his shoulder, but had no idea what it was, let alone to which story it referred. The rest eluded me totally.

There are four statues worldwide at present of Holmes. The one in Meiringen is the oldest, dating from September 1988. The one in Japan, in the town where the Japanese translator for Holmes worked, had to settle for the second oldest, since it was unveiled in October 1988. The one in Edinburgh, near where Conan Doyle lived, dates from 1989. After that flurry of three statues, London finally put up its Holmes statue, near the Baker Street underground station, a full decade later, in 1999. I thought that was it, but I just found out through Google that one more Holmes statue is in the works. Care to guess where? Moscow is planning one to go up near the British Embassy. And, uniquely, Moscow wants to include Doctor Watson. Museums for fictional characters may be rare, but not statues, since there are more statues of Don Quijote and Sancho Panza in Spain than you can shake a stick at.

This might also be a good time, talking about taking these characters seriously, to mention postage stamps. A number of places have issued Holmes and Watson stamps, including several issues from the UK, of course. I’ll mention two instances. A very nice strip of five UK stamps from 1993, also shown in poster form in the Meiringen museum, illustrates five scenes; the first stamp is Holmes with Watson, and the fifth shows Holmes and Moriarty struggling, and going over the edge at the falls. The other notable stamp is a single from Switzerland from 2007 showing Reichenbach Falls. The text reads, on six lines: The Final Problem; Sir Arthur Conan Doyle; 1891; Reichenbachfall; Helvetia, 180. (To avoid multiple languages, Switzerland refers to itself using the Latin name, Helvetia; the stamp is for 1 franc 80.)

The Sherlock Holmes Museum in Meiringen is on the lower level of the former English Church, which is toward the back of this park. The Gothic church building is a jewel, but is more the size of a small chapel. The church itself is now a cultural center, and was housing a photographic exhibit when I was there. Admission to the Sherlock Holmes Museum on the lower level is covered by the Swiss Pass. An audio guide is included with entry. Even on the stairway going down there are background, including what achievements Conan Doyle was proud of, and the stamp exhibit. Of the many artifacts below, three hats were memorable. It shows a typical deerstalker cap, but explains that it would have only been worn in the country; the homburg shown is what would have normally been worn in London, and the top hat would have been for formal occasions. It shows London police uniforms of the era as well as period uniforms for conductors on trains to Meiringen. It shows letters to Holmes and sample responses by the secretary. There is also the plaque naming Sherlock Holmes an Honorary Citizen of Meiringen.

But the pièce de résistance of the small museum is behind these exhibits. It’s a full-scale, carefully reconstructed replica of the sitting room at 221b Baker Street. It has the fireplace, authentically reproduced Victorian wallpaper, the violin, the small laboratory, everything following the descriptions in the various works of the canon.

Reichenbach Falls   I had seen when planning the trip that the charm of Meiringen was that, although the same size as other resort towns, it was compact, and you could walk out into the country in just a few minutes, the funicular to Reichenbach Falls being only a 15 to 20-minute walk. Still, my past experience with waterfalls was that they were hidden away, and required a substantial further hike. I was totally amazed when I looked up to the hills from the front entrance to my hotel and could see, not too far away, roughly the top third of the falls, falling into the abyss.

The walk down the main street showed a very traditional and non-touristy Swiss town. However, Meiringen did have a Hotel Sherlock Holmes, and I also passed a restaurant called “Sherlock”, on the front of which was one of those red-black-white street signs that did say “City of Westminster, Baker Street, W.1”. But that was it. In no time I had walked to the edge of town and was crossing the bridge over Aare river, a major tributary of the Rhine, which appears frequently in crossword puzzles, sometimes in the French spelling Aar. As in Luzern, I was amazed at how fast its gray-blue water was flowing. After going up to the falls, when I was back at this bridge, the scene was so enticing so that I, the City Walker, decided to do a country walk on the road along the Aare. On the way back, where it was two kilometers all the way back to the hotel, the skies were threatening, and, just as I walked up the three steps to the hotel, the downpour came. But the lack of shelters on the country walk, as opposed to in town, still wouldn’t deter me to try another if the town is as pleasant as Meiringen.

Anyway, before the walk I went over to the falls. In the plaza before the funicular was the memorial stone I’d heard about. It read that here “occurred the culminating event in the career of Sherlock Holmes … when on May 4, 1891 he vanquished Professor Moriarty, the Napoleon of Crime.” As I said, Holmesians take this sort of thing very seriously. The stone had been erected by “The Norwegian Explorers of Minnesota”, a name that surprised me, as well as by the Sherlock Holmes Society of London.

The funicular, the Reichenbachfall-Bahn, which had been built in 1899, had recently celebrated its centenary with a restoration and new replica cars. There was also the regular hiking path alongside it which Holmes and Watson “must have used” earlier on, in 1891. On festive occasions, I understand the conductor dresses as Holmes. It’s a standard funicular with a cable up the hillside; the down car helps lift the up car, and I couldn’t help think of the more “adventuresome” cars on the Pilatusbahn the day before that seemed to run riot up on their own up the mountain. The Reichenbachfall-Bahn takes 7-10 minutes to roll up the hillside a distance of 714 meters / 2,343 feet, while gaining 244 meters / 801 feet in altitude.

At the top station, there’s little exhibit room which rolls a continuous video of the Sherlock Holmes Society of London visiting in 2005. Everyone on the funicular in the video was dressed in Victorian costumes, and two members performed a struggle near the edge of the terrace, and then the video shows two dummies being thrown down the abyss. I tell you, these people are serious.

The falls themselves are 120 meters / 394 feet high, with seemingly about half above and half below the height of the viewing terrace at the funicular, opposite them. You can hike to the top of the falls, but I didn’t see any need. There were two slender spyglass tubes pointed at a spot on the cliff to the left of the falls to draw your attention to something. The explanatory plaque was in German, English, French, and Italian. I’ll temporarily delete the English, so you can see if you can figure out from the other three languages what it was that you were supposed to be looking for.

The plaque didn’t indicate the background of what you were to look for, but I can explain that, in 1957 (oddly, the year of my first trip to Europe, including Switzerland, as a teenager), the Sherlock Holmes Club determined what it felt was the actual location of the struggle, and had a white star painted there. From my vantage point, I didn’t see how anyone could get to that spot on the cliff to paint the star, let alone have a struggle with someone there. But don’t argue with Sherlockians. The text read in English:

In conclusion, this YouTube video shows the falls as seen from the viewing terrace across the abyss. You cannot see the star, but it’s well to the left of the falls, near the top of the cliff, but below those trees: Reichenbach Falls While watching this, remember Jeremy Brett, as Holmes, saying: “My dream is horrible. I’m fighting with Moriarty at the falls.…”